The ISIS Phenomenon: How Does It End? by Graham Fuller

The ISIS Phenomenon: How Does It End?

November 24, 2014 by Graham E. Fuller • Blog •
http://grahamefuller.com/the-isis-phenomenon-how-does-it-end/

The ISIS Phenomenon: How Does It End?
The ISIS Phenomenon continues to astonish—to notch up innovative new features in Islamist politics that suggest a deepening ability to exploit and feed off long-term accumulated Muslim grievances. What are the logical end-points of extremism at which these forces finally reach terminal collapse? What kind of prognosis can we offer about this phenomenon?
Islamist movements of various hues have of course dominated the field of political opposition to dictatorship in the Muslim world for at least a century —and especially to western-backed autocrats. These movements are based solidly in Islam-inspired political values and tradition—something that liberal secular movements in the Middle East can never accomplish. Anger in the Muslim world against long decades, even centuries, of western imperialism and interventionism, have long been the source and fuel of these movements.
Accumulated, these resentments ultimately exploded most dramatically on US soil with 9/11. America’s military response—non-stop war in many parts of the Muslim world since 2002, US boots on the ground, and massive damage to the infrastructure and lives of Muslims in Afghanistan, Somalia, Libya, Iraq, Syria, Pakistan, and Yemen—further fertilized the soil for Islamic radicalism. The grandfather of all such problems, the plight of the Palestinians under harsh occupation by Israel for half a century now, continues to exude poison; the tinder of Jerusalem is again awaiting its next big spark.
The grammar of terrorism (or resistance, or Islamic reassertion—however we choose to call it) continues to evolve. Al-Qaeda declared itself to the world in a stunning act of guerrilla war, the boldest blow ever against America in its 9/11 assault. For many impotent Muslims al-Qaeda was a “yes, we can” moment, dramatic proof that the Muslim World is not powerless to respond to long-term massive Western firepower. That operation led to the creation of al-Qaeda franchises around much of the world, still functioning and lethal even after Bin Laden’s death. But al-Qaeda’s strategy based itself on constant, probing jihadist attacks against US installations everywhere; it represented the latest order of radical Islamist expression.
But ISIS, the “Islamic state of Iraq and Syria” has broken yet new ground, indeed carried the radical cause to a new level, in two major respects: territory and the Caliphate.